The Herd

I wrote this a few hours Khaleid Hosseini came to my school to give a talk, and he ended up inspiring that last line of the second stanza.

In the shade of maple trees and your mother’s pastel arms, you read your first book, a book that coaxes first hesitant syllables out of your mouth, then words: sixteen, maybe, paranoia. Gates give and burst, as you watch beasts tumbling out, your eyes as wide as stars: your flummoxed herds of borborygmus, your passionate katzenjammers lurching in the ether. And although the dust rising from fluttering wings seeps into your lungs, and the thundering hooves of consonants

jostle your heart

beat, your mother’s fixed smile still hovers serenely as you ask, mama, what does it mean to die?

In Shanghai, your first footsteps shatter the neon characters who swim in litter-filled puddles and plant dreams: the old smell of karaoke and nightlife worms its way into your thoughts, memories murmuring that you’ve never left. But you peer into the filmy eyes of the men fused to the tile of the sidewalk; rusted saplings crouching in the dank cracks, the feeble melody of their frosted breaths and cardboard songs: please, please my wife lost legs eyes, words but thoughts so sown in your ears, already more familiar to you than the beat of your own heart.

In the sunset, you look one last time upon the creases in your daughter’s face, always carved far too soon, the taste of the first book still dancing fresh and crisp on your tongue. The abyss yawns forward wistfully. You sigh and take your last, echoing step and set free your last word, muscles shuddering, wings tossing the air as it soars to her ears: goodbye, come to find a new home.

And in the dark, a wild animal finally joins the herd.

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